Artwork and Animation Reviews by Christopher Signore - often for shows of the obscure sort

Monday, 2 January 2012

From Here to Timbuctoo

Happy New Year, everyone! Here's to many new, exciting things to come in 2012 for all of us =)

In honour of Ronnie Corbett (one half of UK double act The Two Ronnies) receiving his New Year's Honour, here's another notable series many may remember him from.

Following his success with the Mr. Men and Little Miss series, Roger Hargreaves also wrote another little series called Timbuctoo in the late 70's. The books tell the stories of a group of animals, each named after the sound they make - like Woof (a sort of Dog), Buzz (a sort of Bee), Squeak (a sort of Mouse), and so on. Each book follows a similar patten: some of them have odd little problems that they eventually overcome by even odder methods.

The books were later reprinted in the 90's (and re-illustrated by Roger's son, Adam) when an animated series was created by Flicks Films, who also worked on all the animated Mr. Men animated shows of the 70's and 80's respectively (although Terry Ward did have a hand to play with the 90's series by Marina Productions) as well as Bananaman in the 80's.

In comparison to the Mr. Men / Little Miss books, the original Timbuctoo stories were a little more simpler and didn't quite have the same spark of imagination. Luckily, when it came to adapting them for the animated series, writer Richard Everett (Busy Buses, Nellie the Elephant) was able to give them a much-needed boost in terms of story and character.

And of course, the narration and voices were provided by "Little Ronnie" himself, which is bit as charming as its rather unique theme tune...!

About Me

A creative, funny chap brought up on classic 'toons from Looney Tunes to Danger Mouse. Constantly drawing and writing, he is aiming to land a career in Character Design and/or script writing with new characters or old.